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Death to Serial Movies.

Don’t get me wrong. I LOVE good movies. I don’t watch every new movie that comes out, but a few just won’t translate to the small screen and the comfort of your home. They need to be seen and heard on the big screen in all their Dolby-inspired glory, hearing aids be damned. Long movies test my limits. No matter how comfortable the seat or how delicious the popcorn, I easily become bored. I really have to want to see a movie before I simply wait for it to come top Netflix or Pay-per-View. We, as viewers, are constantly bombarded by a stream of sequels, prequels, and alternative endings. It’s too much to keep up with. Now, we have the advent of the cliffhanger movies. The original thirty-minute cliffhangers of the 50’s and 60’s left the viewer eager for the next installment of Buck Rogers or the Lone Ranger. They were just a part of the afternoon theater experience. Lately, they’ve become all-consuming monsters.

I watched all three Lord of the Rings movies. I enjoyed the book better, but I did like the movies, especially the scenery, though I would have been just as entertained without watching every boring mile they walked or rode. I didn’t like paying for three movies just to follow a story. I got snookered again with the Hobbit Trilogy. I will watch the last one under protest. I watched the first two Hunger Games movies. I refuse to pay for two-movie ending. It isn’t worth it.I don’t care that much for completion.

Now, I learn that King’s The Stand will come to the big screen in four movies. Enough is enough. We’re talking about $50 for a re-made television special. Has something changed? Did The Walking Dude win this time? Will Randall Flag have a change of heart and reach reconciliation? Were the original actors so bad that a demand for new talent, new actors with new approaches, is warranted? I don’t think so.

No way in hell will I shell out the cash for this remake. I saw the new The Shining, the new Spiderman, the new Superman, the endless remakes of the endlessly boring Batman movies. Hollywood can take a great movie and destroy it with abandoned glee, but I have yet to see a remake that is superior to the original. Whatever happened to making a movie that doesn’t require a bank loan or an investment of time capital to watch?

Maybe I’m jaded. I still watch old movies whenever I can, even the ones I’ve seen twenty times. Old actors acted. New actors play themselves time after time. I admit Jonny Depp is great. He has a wide range of characters. He’s the exception. Most are like Keanu Reeves – lifeless and wooden.

I don’t mind serial novels. It allows the author to exploit his characters or his world. However, bringing serials to the silver screen is a bad experiment. It’s cheap and easy for a studio to film several movies at the same time and split them up, but the savings isn’t passed along to the consumer. We’re getting screwed. I say Death to Serial Movies!